English

Majorana stellar representation for mixed-spin $(s,\frac{1}{2})$ systems

Quantum Physics 2024-04-10 v2

Abstract

By describing the evolution of a quantum state with the trajectories of the Majorana stars on a Bloch sphere, Majorana's stellar representation provides an intuitive geometric perspective to comprehend a quantum system with high-dimensional Hilbert space. However, the problem of the representation of a two-spin coupling system on a Bloch sphere has not been solved satisfactorily yet. Here, we present a practical method to resolve the problem for the mixed-spin (s,1/2)(s, 1/2) system. The system can be decomposed into two spins: spin-(s+1/2)(s+1/2) and spin-(s1/2)(s-1/2) at the coupling bases, which can be regarded as independent spins. Besides, we may write any pure state as a superposition of two orthonormal states with one spin-(s+1/2)(s+1/2) state and the other spin-(s1/2)(s-1/2) state. Thus, the whole state can be regarded as a state of a pseudo spin-1/21/2. In this way, the mixed spin decomposes into three spins. Therefore, we can represent the state by (2s+1)+(2s1)+1=4s+1(2s+1)+(2s-1)+1=4s+1 sets of stars on a Bloch sphere. Finally, to demonstrate our theory, we give some examples that indeed show laconic and symmetric patterns on the Bloch sphere, and unveil the properties of the high-spin system by analyzing the trajectories of the Majorana stars on a Bloch sphere.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1904.02462,
  title  = {Majorana stellar representation for mixed-spin $(s,\frac{1}{2})$ systems},
  author = {Yuguo Su and Fei Yao and Yanming Che and Li-Bin Fu and Xiaoguang Wang},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1904.02462},
  year   = {2024}
}